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Life without Books

"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses." Abraham Lincoln

Whats the old adage? You dont know what youve got till its gone.

Like books.

I was always a big reader. While I was growing up, there was a library of hardcover childrens classics in my sisters room  Little Women, Little Men, Swiss Family Robinson, Five Little Peppers. Each time one of us children got sick, my Dad would bring home another book to add to the collection. I loved immersing myself in another time, another place, another world.

Its a family trait. Every afternoon as dinner simmered on the stove, my mother would curl up on the couch with her nose in a book. She read three or four books per week. As long as it was nonfiction, shed read anything. My older sister loved science fiction. Dad liked politics and history and biographies.

I liked reading about real people in difficult circumstances. My all-time favorite book is The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom. Its the story of a family of Dutch Christians during WWII who built a secret room in their house to hide Jews. Equally inspiring is the book, Give Us This Day by Sidney Stewart, which chronicles his survival of the Bataan Death March.

I also enjoyed C. S. Lewiss The Chronicles of Narnia, and anything by Erma Bombeck.

My husband and I have raised our children with the same love of books. Currently, Peter is reading a biography of Teddy Roosevelt. The four kids, ages 17-23, are reading Harry Potter (again), the C.S. Lewis space trilogy, a murder mystery and a tome about the relationship between theology and physics.

And me? I have not read a book for 17 years.

Now you know my unhappy secret.

It began on July 31, 1991. I was under 35, healthy, with three small children and a fourth on the way. Peter and I arose early that morning and slipped into the gray dawn for the drive to the hospital wed been planning for nine months. I carried my little duffel up the stairwell, joked with the nurses and settled into a labor and delivery room, fully expecting that events would transpire in a predictable and straightforward manner. In a few hours, wed call home with the news that James or Victoria had been born.

But it was not straightforward or predictable at all. Instead, I suffered an exceptionally rare embolism that causes pulmonary failure, cardiac arrest or massive hemorrhaging. Typically, the mother dies within 4-5 minutes.

By the grace of God, I survived, but I suffered oxygen deprivation. It destroyed chunks of my long-term memory, and damaged my ability to focus, sequence and organize.

The key problem is that I can no longer read more than a few paragraphs. My eyes flit all over the page, my mind wanders, I get antsy. When I pick up the newspaper, the best I can do is to read the first and last paragraphs of a story, then try to infer the rest. It doesnt work very well.

More than anything, I miss the books. I miss losing myself in a place and time beyond my little world. I miss the excitement, the knowledge, the laughter, the intrigue. Books draw you into someone elses world, allowing you to escape the problems of the day and fill your mind with wonder.

Only recently did I arrive at a system that permits me to listen to audio books in the car. I can only listen to small portions at a time and sometimes have trouble with narrative sections, but for me it is a victory beyond expression. My first selection was the Harry Potter series, followed by the true-life story of a plane crash in the Andes Mountains. I am loving every word.

People look at me as if Im crazy when I say that I cannot read. They think Im joking, or exaggerating. Who ever heard of a writer who cant read? I cant explain it; it just is. I do know that such problems are common among survivors of this complication of childbirth.

A few friends have asked if Im bitter. The answer is no. Im not bitter, just sad. But despite the loss, I praise God for his goodness. I am alive to raise our children, to celebrate 30 years of marriage, to enjoy our parents and siblings and crazy nieces and nephews. God is good.